100 goals in 100 weeks

My bucket list

Many times in interviews in the run up to the “aLife4Sale” auction I was asked what I would do once I had sold my life. I didn’t really know, so I started making lists – places I would like to go, things I would like to do, people I would like to meet and skills I wanted to master.

I eventually ended up with a “bucket list” of 100 lifetime goals. I would need a timeframe. 100 weeks sounded just about right.

A Life Sold is available all over the world, from Amazon and other online retailers. You can order it as a paperback or download it as a digital eBook. Click the image to the left to secure your copy.

Scroll down, or click here to see a complete list of all 100 goals tackled

Goals still to be achieved

I tried to arrange this goal on several occasions, in several locations. In Salt Lake City my buddy Clay has a few TV program pals, and thought he might be able to get something arranged for this goal. The biggest problem he ran into was finding a suitable body of water to put a car into, due to pretty strict environmental regulations.
When I found myself with a few spare days in Kathmandu, heading next for England, I put some postings on UK diver forums, looking for suggestions for locations, and offers of assistance for safety cover. I didn’t quite expect the level of controversy that my posting would receive. Opinion on my proposed goal was incredibly polarised. After much back-and-forth discussion, I pretty-much wrote off the UK as a possible venue.
Finally, back in the States again, a friend of a Hollywood stuntman contacted me on Facebook, but unfortunately I never heard from the daredevil himself!
At times I have considered simply buying a car, and driving it off a pier somewhere. However, I have always been keen to avoid two potentially undesirable consequences – being arrested and ending up with a hefty fine, or worse, getting trapped in the car with nobody there to assist! Common sense has prevailed here. Unable to do this safely, I have decided to wait until such a time as I can do this in the way I would like. I am sure I will get around to doing it one day.

I came so close with this one, managing to gather four Ian Ushers in a pub in London. I have tried on several occasions since then to achieve this goal. I even arranged a Skype call, hoping to at least be able to gather five of us together on an internet call. The three other Ians from the original gathering all agreed to be part of the final attempt, but despite many emails to many other Ians, I couldn’t get one more involved.
I had thought this might be a reasonably easy goal to achieve – I mean, how hard can it be to get five guys together for a beer? But despite my best efforts, it would seem that most Ian Ushers are not the slightest bit interested in meeting any of their namesakes.
Thanks though to the Ians who did take part, sorry we couldn’t make it happen.

As far as I know, and I have done quite a bit of research, there is only one company that offers deep-dive submersible tours down to the Titanic. It lies on the Atlantic sea-bed off the coast of Newfoundland, at a depth of over 12,000 feet. That’s over two miles down, and it is an extremely dangerous trip.
Unfortunately, there was no expedition in 2010, the next one being planned for 2011. I am on the mailing list for information, but another factor which makes this a particularly difficult goal is the expected cost of the expedition – $55,000 per person! Unless this book is a runaway bestseller, this one may not happen for a while yet!

This is another goal upon which I have been working, on and off, over the course of the 100 weeks. Lucid dreaming is when, in a dream, you realise that you are dreaming. Apparently it is then possible to control the direction of the dream, and make it about whatever you want.
I have had this happen only twice, once long ago, and once during the course of the 100 weeks. I would like to be able to do this on a more regular basis, to count it as a goal completed.
It is something on which I intend to keep working in the future.

I think I perhaps put off beginning my fundraising efforts for too long, concentrating on other goals instead. I managed to raise over $10,000 for my chosen cause, of which I am very proud, but it is still a long way from my original target of $50,000.
I can’t make any excuses, but perhaps the world economic climate over the past year or two has made this particular goal a bigger challenge. I received many emails from people who would have liked to help out, but unfortunately, were not in a position to do so.
Many thanks to all who did contribute, or would have liked to. Your support is greatly appreciated, both by myself, and by the Australian Bowel Cancer Association. It is also appreciated, I am sure, by the people whose lives may well be saved by earlier recognition of the onset of symptoms, and by more effective treatment which ongoing research facilitates.

I have always imagined that one day I might see my own child being born, and this was a goal on a list from long ago. Maybe this will never happen for me, I don’t know, but I left this goal on the list regardless. I think this must still be an incredibly moving experience, obviously more so if you have a connection to the parents, rather than it just being a random stranger.
Maybe I will still be lucky enough to experience this one day.

What next?

At the end of the 100 week journey I moved to Whitehorse in Canada’s Yukon Territory, where I settled with Moe and her two kids, Finn and Maible.

Moe had helped me achieve Goal # 26, dog-sledding in the wilderness, in December 2008. You can see the video of that goal being achieved above.

I spent the next five months writing my first book, A Life Sold, which tells the complete story of my adventures from the beginning of the eBay auction to the end of the goal achieving journey.

I was also waiting to hear from Walt Disney Pictures about whether they were still interested in buying the movie rights to my story.